


Optimization

by ExtraPenguin



Category: The Goblin Emperor - Katherine Addison
Genre: Competence Porn, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-04-29
Packaged: 2018-06-05 07:18:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6695044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ExtraPenguin/pseuds/ExtraPenguin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Alcethmeret's pneumatic system is tragically suboptimal. Karo Voskhodin does not like suboptimal things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Optimization

**Author's Note:**

> Join us on the IRC channel: http://www.slashnet.org/webclient/thegoblinemperor

Karo Voskhodin was sixteen when she entered the hallowed ranks of the pneumatic girls. Her father, Venra Voskhodar, was a mechanic who fixed people's broken apparati. Her mother, Saiu Voskhodaran, helped at the bakery. She was the eldest child of four, and like her younger siblings, had been raised to be useful help for her father in his repair shop. Now, it was time for her to earn her own income as an adult to supplement her dowry and eventually provide additional sustenance to her own family.

The shift boss, Min Stantin, told her that her job was to pick up all the incoming messages from the floor where they fell, and place them into the appropriate tube for their destination.

“...and if someone should send a message when there is a message going that way, the tubes become clogged. One can sense it from the vibrations in the pipes. When that happens, you must pull that rope there and alert one of the mechanics on duty of the pipe that has the blockage.”

Karo frowned. “Why not have one set of tubes for messages coming here and another for messages going away? That would completely eliminate the collision blockages.”

Min Stantin sighed. “The system was originally designed to only send messages here, from where they could be hand-delivered. It was only Varevesena who decreed that we must have messages traveling both ways, so as to free up couriers.” A message tube fell onto the floor. Min Stantin lifted it up, read the intended recipient, then placed it into another pipe. “There simply isn't room for a parallel set of pipes, I'm afraid.” She shrugged in a delicate manner much more befitting of an Osmin. “We make do.”

Karo kept her expression neutral, but inside, she was calculating. The message capsules were reasonably small in comparison to the pipes, with a large amount of the airseal achieved with the skirt. It might just be possible to make a second lane of pipe…

Karo's first shift went slowly by, with the occasional message dropping in. For each one, she had to consult a truly vast reference book to figure out which tube's end the recipient was at. In a few cases, the shortest route was to simply place the message in the “out” box by the door.

 

That evening, Karo chose to spend her few free hours before sleep at the Untheileneise Court's library, deep in investigation of the pneumatic system. The architect, Dachensol Brana Chekhar, had meticulously documented every choice he'd made, as well as the reasons why. The tubes had been intentionally made larger than strictly necessary due to Chekhar's hope that they would be eventually used for items larger and heavier than simple correspondence. The vacuum pumps were thus overtuned for mere message traffic.

Karo took out the pen and paper she'd brought, and began copying the map of the network of pipes. Then, she altered it so that there would be two sets of pipes, running parallel. The overtunedness of the vacuum pumps powering the network meant that she could simply assign half of them for one direction and the other half for the other without loss – though she would like to have additional pumps for some stretches. Taking the current pipes' exterior diameter and dividing that by two would give the new pipes' exterior diameter. Now, the message capsules had to fit amply, but even that requirement left Karo with an interior diameter that would permit pipes thicker than the current one.

She added more notes to the edges, then gathered her things. Tomorrow was a whole new world, as her father often said. Not necessarily better, but new.

 

Karo spent the next few days refining her plans. She asked the other girls who manned the pneumatic station about which people sent and received the most mail, noted that down, and made plans for extending the relevant tubes some tens of meters down the hallways so as to reduce the amount of time spent in transit.

Her plan would be large, so she calculated first the material costs of the pipes and the newer, smaller-skirted message capsules, and then estimated the labor costs of installation. The tally was large, but not outrageously so.

In fact, it was small enough that Karo might not even have to ask for Imperial approval! She smirked.

She showed up for her next shift in her best dress (as opposed to the trousers she had occasionally worn when she knew that Min Stantin was elsewhere) and afterwards, went to speak with Echelo Esaran.

Merrem Esaran was not convinced when Karo explained her proposal and the benefits it would bring. “Would it be of use?”

“Yes, Merrem Esaran.” Karo considered for a moment, then chose the expression of determined competence over that of wide-eyed innocence. “The messages in the tubes have grown more frequent, and it would be better to upgrade them as soon as possible.”

Merrem Esaran bit her lip. A while later, she said: “Are we truly the person whose permission you need to ask?”

“Yes, you are”, Karo said. She had spent four hours making sure of that. “‘All matters of changes to the Alcethmeret or other Imperial households must be approved by the steward of said household, unless the total cost is large enough that the matter must go to His Serenity himself.’ You are the steward of the household, and the costs are well below the line at which we must bother His Serenity.”

Merrem Esaran did then give her permission for the changes, though it was much like pulling teeth.

 

Karo immediately went to work, distributing notices over the disturbance to the pneumatic network, purchasing the appropriate amount of piping with enough pieces with the correct bend radius, and hiring contractors. It may have generated a bit of a hubbub amongst the courtiers, but Karo didn't have it in her to care: there was work to do!

She drafted all the other pneumatic girls into overseeing that the pipes went in correctly and that everything was installed the right way round, then ran around the Alcethmeret organizing anyone who looked to be even vaguely related to her project. It took a scant few weeks, during which Min Stantin came back from visiting her infirm grandfather and was shocked at the havoc Karo had wreaked in her absence, though she was quickly placated by a steel factory representative who'd come to check in showing romantic interest in her.

Then, the test. Karo assigned a pneumatic girl to send a message from the end of each pneumatic line to the pneumatic station, from which Karo would send the message back. The pneumatic girls would then come back with the message if all went correctly, or would send word of malfunction.

The first messages dropped down to the boxes beneath the in-tubes within a few minutes of the time Karo had expected for them to arrive. Placing them into the upwards-angled mouths of the out-tubes was quick work. Soon, she had ticked off all of the tubes, save the one that served the Emperor's bedchambers.

The final message dropped in. Karo sent it back, and made a mental note to investigate the cause of delay.

The pneumatic girls from the other lines began trickling in, messages in hand. No unexpected delays, then. Karo was proud of her work.

Finally, the pneumatic girl assigned to the tardy line, Min Velan Blazhin, arrived.

She curtsied. “Min Voskhodin, His Serenity would like to see you in the Tortoise Room.”

“We shall go”, Karo said. “What caused the delay with the message?”

Min Blazhin blushed a delicate pink. “We at first accidentally inserted the message into the wrong tube. Please, forgive us.”

“It pleases us to know that there was no problem with the system”, Karo said. “Now, we shall attend the Emperor.”

 

Karo was received in the Tortoise Room. She was dreadfully underprepared, in that she had not had time to research what such a location of receiving might mean, but she had been invited immediately after her repairs of the pneumatic system had come to fruition, so she was probably not going to be scolded or fired.

She arrived at the gates of the Alcethmeret, and was escorted to the Tortoise Room.

She prostrated herself in a perfunctory fashion, and rose after being invited to do so. Her sister Airo might've scolded her for appearing before the _Emperor_ in workman's trousers, but Karo had better things to think about than flutter around in tragically pocketless women's dresses.

“We believe that you are the one behind the recent inoperation of the pneumatic tubes?” Edrehasivar asked.

“We are”, Karo said. “The prior iteration of the tubes permitted for message traffic to pass only one way at a time, occasionally clogging the tubes should two messages collide. We pored over the plans and discovered that we could cheaply upgrade the system to have two parallel pipes, one for each direction of message traffic, so that the system would not have messages collide and thus increasing maximum capacity. We approved the budget with the appropriate authority, Merrem Esaran, and then hired contractors. Today's test proved that the new system works.”

Edrehasivar looked pleased. His secretary looked upon Karo with open admiration.

“We thank you for this thoughtfulness, Min Voskhodin”, Edrehasivar said. “How may we repay you?” His secretary made a concerned noise.

Karo thought for a moment, then said: “We are sure you have other systems that could be improved.” She smiled. This would be fun.


End file.
